Saturday, April 12, 2014

STEPHEN COLBERT REPORTING FOR DUTY

I know zee-ro about those late night talk shows. So much so, I cannot even name any of them: "The Letterman Show"?

A dramatic opening is best to open with. The fact is I am more than aware of the television red-eye form the way anyone would be; through a cultural osmosis. In the late 1970s and early 1980s I did see minutes of Johnny Carson here and there. I saw this one 'live': "... creeps! You know where to find me, gentlemen." (The studio audience went nuts. Carson was referring to the hot-off-the-presses lawsuit business in the Carol Burnett/Henry Kissinger/National Enquirer affair. The court judge had ruled in favour of Burnett.)

Those are my late-night show notes. The host shufflings between the various big television networks and their respective and, to them, vital, late-night programs are generally lost on me.

Stephen Colbert, as much as his politics are in line with my own, I know mostly through his reputation of playing a raging right-winger and the fact that I watched about five minutes of an episode. The replacement action started when David Letterman (that guy I mentioned in the first paragraph) decided recently to call it quits; Colbert was chosen as the new man to keep that seat warm. (Hmm... "seat" is an apt word, the more I think about it.)

In yesterday's Washington Post, columnist Kathleen Parker, in response by a rant by Rush Limbaugh, writes that American Heartlanders should not fear Stephen Colbert. I would only fear the tedium and vapidity inherent in those late-night yaks. I don't give a toss about the culture of celebrity, so I don't give a rat's-arse if such-and-such is on Colbert tonight.

What a dreary job that must be, hosting a late-night talk show.


Kathleen Parker and her bit in the Washington Post, which has given me more information than I have ever known about Colbert. "It was satire, folks"...

America’s heartland has nothing to fear from Stephen Colbert
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/kathleen-parker-americas-heartland-shouldnt-fear-stephen-colbert/2014/04/11/1f70ab98-c1ad-11e3-b574-f8748871856a_story.html?wpisrc=nl_opnsat



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